And the best of Michigan's safeties - Ernest Shazor, Jamar Adams, Jordan Kovacs - are/were fringe NFL guys. Shazor didn't get drafted, Adams caught on a little bit with the Seahawks, and Kovacs isn't guaranteed of being picked in April.

To play devil's advocate: it's not uncommon for players to commit to one school, only to flip when they finally get the offer from the prominent in-state school, especially when they have teammates going there.

But in this particular situation, Michigan has a great defensive coaching staff and is heading in a much better direction that Iowa is. Since Hill committed to Iowa, he has seen them lose to Central Michigan en route to missing a bowl. In that same time, he has seen Michigan slaughter Iowa and put together its second straight top-10 recruiting class. Hill has very little connection to Iowa outside of them being the first big time program to offer him.

Fair enough, but I think that's mostly just rhetoric. Saying, "Only a fool can turn down such an offer" is a common expression, and does not literally mean everyone who turns it down is stupid. Obviously Iowa has redeeming qualities, but you have to admit that most kids from Detroit don't pick Iowa over Michigan when they have offers from both. Or kids from not-Detroit, for that matter.

Iowa is also one of those big ten teams that is good in phases, and they're starting a down slope. Michigan is most assuredly on the upslope. Not arrogant, just watched some football this fall. Iowa had a new d coordinator this year. And they went 4-8. I stand by my statement.

and it doesnt hurt that when Ferentz worked for the Browns in the 90's he worked with Belichik, Pioli, Jim Schwartz and a whole lot of others I'm probably forgetting. He is held in very high regard by a lot of NFL coaches and front office people.

Gonna disagree with you that one. I've never gotten the impression that Tom panders to anyone. And I've never got the impression Tom is super optimistic about McQuay either. Certainly thinks we're up there, but as he's even said, McQuay doesn't talk to anybody hardly at all. Most stuff about McQuay seems like educated guessing rather than informed reporting at this point.

I had a source on Diamond that was as good as any info Tom VH had short of asking Diamond himself. Brian Cook supported me in posting when I told him who my sources were. This source was better than 90 percent confident Diamond was coming to M and ruled out Auburn completely a week or more before Diamond announced. What happened? Only Diamond himself knows entirely as he didn't even tell people close to him that he spoke with every day. So I don't think it's pandering or playing things up for Insiders, I think that some recruits are just that unpredictable and change their minds a lot.

Couldn't all that just be that recruits change their mind all the time? Maybe recruit is telling Tom (or any analyst for that matter) that UM is on top, then a week later decides he wants to go somewhere else. Doesn't mean the analyst is pandering to the subscribers when they reported UM is on top. I don't really remember what Tom said on Kozan and Diamond, but I specifically remember Garnett. He was being his typical cryptic self, the abrubtly stopped talking about him for a week. Some poster called him out on it, and he said (paraphrasing) 'Ah, you caught that did you? Well somethings have changed, and I'm not nearly as confident in Garnett as I was before. UM still has a chance, but I can't call it now'. This was about a week before the announcement when even Sam Webb was confident in Garnett to UM. Afterward, didn't Garnett basically confirm just that. I was under the impression he had UM leading late until the very end when he decided on Stanford. VH has always been cautious with his information he puts out there. If you want to see pandering, check out anything Bucknuts' staff writers put out on recruiting, or whatever the hell Alex at Eleven Warriors writes about OSU recruiting.

Agreed, just like the optimism over Green. Just don't see either one coming here. Glad the coaches are starting to figure out the backup plans and are making it happen with about two months to go rather than waiting on the all star games or after to be surprised. Maybe they learned something from the big whiffs at the end of last year?

Not at all. I just happen to think that Green is looking for another school that isn't a tire fire in the midst of a coaching change, isn't about to get destroyed by sanctions, and isn't called Michigan. Given that he initially drilled down to Auburn, Tennesse, and Michigan, then watched the other two schools implode and now seems determined to look around tells me there's something about Michigan that doesn't speak to him, which is fine. Not sure how any of that is flamebait or trolling.

That Hoke is putting out offers for Cass Tech kids (good players too) with not a whole lot of hope of actually getting them, but more to keep the pipeline. There have been a lot of interesting offers to local kids lately and not really a ton of push to actually get them. It seems that they may be doing this to stay in the good graces of many coaches and schools.

Again, not saying these aren't good prospects, just seems they've been doing it a lot in the past month or so.

"There have been a lot of interesting offers to local kids lately and not really a ton of push to actually get them."

How do you know this? A statement (or really an accusation) like this means you have insider information that allows you to compare the recruiting efforts of this staff among different recruits. Is that the case, or are you just making shit up?

I was making an observation on how it appears to me. I didn't say that they were doing that and I know it, I said it seems like that. The fact that they have been offering a lot of local kids may be because they think they have a better shot at landing them this late in the process, or it could be to stay in the good graces of the coaches and schools. To me it seems more like the latter rather than the former, but I could be wrong.

So, no, I'm not just making shit up. You need to read the context of my post before getting pissy about something that was in no way disrespectful (or as you call it, "an accusation", as if the coaches were doing what I have the feeling they are doing is bad to begin with).

Haha, Wow. No. You speculated as to why they were handing out a lot of offers ("it seems like"), but you did not spectulate that they were not putting any "push" behind them. You stated the latter as fact. You may want to read your own post for crying out loud. There's one basic thing you are not allowing for - time. If the coaches just put out these offers, it might take time for them to put some "push" behind them. Let it play out a bit before you accuse them of just throwing out offers and not really trying to recruit those who were offered.

Dont accuse me of being pissy by mischaracterizing what you wrote. Re-read your own post first.

I don't think it's "scrambling" as much as trying to tie up loose ends. This is sort of what happens at the end of a recruiting process to fill in spots. Things start to align, the roster starts to sort itself out through injuries and attrition, kids narrow their lists, and new offers go out.

Not scrambling. The offers that go out earlier are for guys the coaches know they want, no matter what. But as time goes, the coaches see who commits, who leaves the team, which players on the team look good (and which ones don't), and how many spots they have.

Recruiting is fluid, remember that. Maybe the coaches feel Hill had a good senior season, or maybe they feel like they need safeties more now than they did in July.

I haven't seen much of him this year, but I wasn't all that impressed with his junior film. He has pretty good speed, but he's not a great tackler and isn't very physical. He played mostly in the box for Cass Tech, so I imagine he'd be a strong safety (not big enough to be a LB). It would be nice if he were a better tackler. Maybe he's put on some weight, added some strength, and improved that aspect of his game, though.

That's pretty standard for a Cass Tech kid though - they often need more technique work, but are great athletes. Hell, Thomas Gordon didn't even play defense until his senior year in high school, and he's our starting safety. As Ken said below, he had one of the best 40 times at the Opening, despite being 200lb already, and if he was at The Opening, he must do the camp stuff very well.

I'm not sure if you can call him under the radar. He has been committed to a big10 school since april, plays for a prominent, familiar, and good high school team, and is a 4* to 247, scout, and rivals. I'm not sure what about that leads you to under the radar. It just seems like he is the replacement offer to McQuay, who the coaches feel is unlikely to end up here. I don't mean that in a bad way, I think he would be a good addition to the class, just that McQuay is an elite prospect.

This is an interesting offer. A 4 star from a pipe line school. I'm unsure if Hill is as interested in Michigan as many of the other Technicians, as I haven't really heard much from him. Will be interesting if he decided to take a visit here, or if he decides to stick with his Iowa commitment. I must say, recruiting is picking up a bit recently!

I was in faver of offering Hill along time ago.I think it is important to go after in state talent and keeping a pipeline flowing. Also he is a 4 star across the board!Not a bad consolation prize if Mcquay goes elsewhere.

You have no idea how this offer would affect future recruiting at Cass Tech. If you think kids, parents, coaches and family members don’t take these things personally you are mistaken. When a kid gets an offer from a school it makes the kid and the coach feel validated. The opposite of that is feeling slighted. If a player/coach feels slighted by a team they may act and talk negatively about that team. Now if they have been given reason to like a school they may keep it positive. Many People around the Cass Tech program are connected. It’s a fairly reasonable assumption that this could affect a future situation.Are 17 and 18 year old kids easily swayed?

The list would help us allocate points to the final recruits to assess the closing prowess of the staff. We have fallen in the rankings as other programs reach 20+ kids and we missed on several priority recruits at the end last year.

First rounders get 5 pts, 2 rounders 4, etc. We could use their Rivals rating but there is minimal point value differential with 5.5-6.0 clustering.

Last year we missed on Garnett, Diamond, Dunne and Kozan in the last 2 months and finished with Johnson, Darboh, Chessun, Henry and Norfleet. Those 5 contributed marginally this year and the WRs might play some next year (although Treadwell is probably more advanced than either of them).

This year already has our losing Conley with 8 wks left and we now have an offering bonanza to grab Illinois, MSU, Cal, and Iowa commits. It's crazy to think we could lose our top 3 to Vandy, Ole Miss, and Tennessee. Raiding the 2nd tier because we lose recruits to the 2nd tier.

This whole platform of yours only focuses on the guys late in the process. Most teams lose out on those guys, because they have a list of 5 or so top teams, and pick one. And it totally negates all of the great pick ups we made early in the season. Hoke has been very good at getting top talent to commit early, and by identifying talent before anyone else does. But one of the downfalls of getting lots of commits early is that you get fewer at the end.

How about we just look at how good our class is at the end and not worry about whether they committed in December or February?

Hill is almost up to 200 pounds and stands about 6'2. Good size. Legit speed for someone his size too. He was a BEAST at The Opening, which had all the top prospects in attendance. Ball-hawk type, and has very good fundamentals IRT tackling, wrapping up, etc. Very good at coming down hill(no pun). He has gotten and is more physical than a year ago.

One thing that is never mentioned when some recruits hold out or wait to decide when it comes to Michigan is that I believe some may fear the higher academic challenge that Michigan provides. Some of these athletes may be a little apprehensive for this reason and that's nothing against them but they are not going to say that as a reason.